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| [[File:Topic Cover - 5.2 Scientific Optimism.png|thumb]]
| | {{Cover|5.2 Scientific Optimism}} |
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| Without scientific optimism, the idea that science is necessarily iterative and if we as scientists keep looking we will eventually gain insights, scientists would have discovered far less than they have.
| | We introduce what may be called the "gas pedal of scientific progress"—a can-do spirit as a psychological trick to help one stick to a problem long enough to solve it. We motivate students with a relentless sense of optimism about their own ability to solve difficult problems, as well as demonstrate the practical importance of iterative progress. |
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| == The Lesson in Context == | | == The Lesson in Context == |
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| This lesson teaches students that one's optimistic and persistent attitude towards scientific problem solving is just as important as understanding the philosophical underpinnings of the scientific method. Throughout the semester, we teach students how science or human reasoning can go awry, and it is important to balance this healthy skepticism with the optimism that iterative progress is still possible in problems big and small. Students will experience this hands-on in an activity in which they have to solve various puzzles that build upon each other. | | This lesson teaches students that one's optimistic and persistent attitude towards scientific problem solving is just as important as understanding the philosophical underpinnings of the scientific method. Throughout the semester, we teach students how science or human reasoning can go awry, and it is important to balance this healthy skepticism with the optimism that iterative progress is still possible in problems big and small. Students will experience this hands-on in an activity in which they have to solve various puzzles that build upon each other. |
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| <!-- Expandable section relating this lesson to earlier lessons. --> | | <!-- Expandable section relating this lesson to other lessons. --> |
| {{Expand|Relation to Earlier Lessons| | | {{Expand|Relation to Other Lessons| |
| | '''Earlier Lessons''' |
| {{ContextLesson|1.2 Shared Reality and Modeling}} | | {{ContextLesson|1.2 Shared Reality and Modeling}} |
| {{ContextRelation|Knowing that our perception and measurement of external reality are inevitably imperfect, it is still possible to collectively make iterative progress towards improving our understanding of the shared reality.}} | | {{ContextRelation|Knowing that our perception and measurement of external reality are inevitably imperfect, it is still possible to collectively make iterative progress towards improving our understanding of the shared reality.}} |
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| {{ContextRelation|Scientific predictions are inevitably imprecise, but the precision (and accuracy) can be numerically estimated (credence level) and iteratively improved over time.}} | | {{ContextRelation|Scientific predictions are inevitably imprecise, but the precision (and accuracy) can be numerically estimated (credence level) and iteratively improved over time.}} |
| {{ContextRelation|Persistance and a "can-do" attitude in problem solving can be developed by harboring a growth mindset and recognizing the value of iterative progress.}} | | {{ContextRelation|Persistance and a "can-do" attitude in problem solving can be developed by harboring a growth mindset and recognizing the value of iterative progress.}} |
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| <!-- Expandable section relating this lesson to later lessons. -->
| | '''Later Lessons''' |
| {{Expand|Relation to Later Lessons|
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| {{ContextLesson|8.1 Orders of Understanding}} | | {{ContextLesson|8.1 Orders of Understanding}} |
| {{ContextRelation|Understanding a complex system fully can seem intractable. Often, a first step in understanding is to make a first-order description of the system. One can then make incremental improvements by tackling second- or third-order effects.}} | | {{ContextRelation|Understanding a complex system fully can seem intractable. Often, a first step in understanding is to make a first-order description of the system. One can then make incremental improvements by tackling second- or third-order effects.}} |
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| {{ContextRelation|One often mistakes scientific progress as a series of correct ideas confirmed by experiments. In reality, experiments are often designed to ''falsify'' a given idea, and only a small number of ideas survive. The rejection of ideas by experimentation is itself a form of incremental scientific progress, rather than failure.}} | | {{ContextRelation|One often mistakes scientific progress as a series of correct ideas confirmed by experiments. In reality, experiments are often designed to ''falsify'' a given idea, and only a small number of ideas survive. The rejection of ideas by experimentation is itself a form of incremental scientific progress, rather than failure.}} |
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| == Takeaways == | | == Takeaways == |
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| </tabber> | | </tabber> |
| | | {{#restricted:{{Private:5.2 Scientific Optimism}}}} |
| == Useful Resources ==
| | {{NavCard|chapter=Lesson plans|text=All lesson plans|prev=5.1 False Positives and Negatives|next=6.1 Correlation and Causation}} |
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| <tabber>
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| |-|Lecture Video=
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| <br /><center><youtube>P5phOVIEmJs</youtube></center>
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| |-|Discussion Slides=
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| {{LinkCard | |
| |url=https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1AVYhZf7Yas6ydjJR0U8XKqHCAEwyObDYsEWcrIHQ34E/
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| |title=Discussion Slides Template
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| |description=The discussion slides for this lesson.
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| }}
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| <br />
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| |-|Handouts and Activities=
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| {{LinkCardInternal | |
| |url=:File:All Optimistic Puzzles - Outline.pdf
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| |title=Optimistic Puzzles
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| |description=The tangram puzzles arranged roughly from easiest to hardest.
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| }}
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| {{LinkCardInternal
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| |url=:File:All Pessimistic Puzzles - Outline.pdf
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| |title=Pessimistic Puzzles
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| |description=The tangram puzzles arranged roughly from hardest to easiest.
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| }}
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| <br />
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| </tabber>
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| == Recommended Outline ==
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| === Before Class ===
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| * ''Very'' carefully read through the [[#Tangram|tangram activity]], make sure the GSI and TA know their respective jobs, and make sure you have access to all the equipment you need.
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| * Print out handouts for the "[[:File:All Optimistic Puzzles - Outline.pdf|optimistic]]" and "[[:File:All Pessimistic Puzzles - Outline.pdf|pessimistic]]" pairs.
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| * Remind the students to come up with a Project 2 topic to be discussed with the GSI in this lesson.
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| === During Class ===
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| {| class="wikitable" style="margin-left: 0px; margin-right: auto;"
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| |5 Minutes
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| |Walk the students through the [[#Warm-up Question|warm-up question]].
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| |30 Minutes
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| |Conduct the [[#Tangram|tangram activity]]. Any pairs that don't take the whole time should be free to work on their Project 2 proposals and talk them over with the GSI.
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| |15 Minutes
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| |Discussion questions from the Tangram activity.
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| |30 Minutes
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| |Have students come up with a Project 2 idea and discuss with the GSI/TA.
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| |}
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| == Lesson Content ==
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| === Warm-up Question ===
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| Which of the following is NOT an example of scientific optimism?
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| # A physicist keeping herself working on a problem by persuading herself that she is making incremental progress.
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| # {{Correct|The public believing that scientific research will eventually cure cancer.}}
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| # A biologist in the 1940s, when the role of DNA had yet to be discovered, extensively researching the new idea that genetic material is carried by polynucleotides rather than proteins, despite the majority of his colleagues' believing that nothing of interest will come of it.
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| # Mathematicians continuously trying to prove Fermat's Last Theorem for 3 centuries following the original conjecture by Fermat in 1637.
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| # Physicists continuing to design experiments searching for other new elementary particles after failing to find some particles they predicted.
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| {{BoxAnswer|title=Explanation|The public is not actually doing the research themselves, so their optimism is not active.}} | |
| === Tangram ===
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| In this activity, we aim to demonstrate the importance of iterative progress in problem solving by giving the problem solver a sense of continued motivation. The students will be asked to work on a series of Tangram puzzles, which are designed so that the solutions to simpler puzzles may help one solve more difficult ones. The class is secretly divided into two halves, with one side given puzzles in the intended order (optimistic, from easy to hard) and the other in a somewhat reversed order (pessimistic, from hard to easy). We hope to see that the optimistic pairs feel more motivated to persist than the pessimistic pairs.
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| ==== Supplies ====
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| Let ''n'' be the number of pairs of students in your section. (If you have an odd number, just make a "pair" of three students.)
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| * 2''n'' complete sets of Tangram puzzles (One complete set consists of seven pieces. You can reuse these from a previous section as long as they're still complete.)
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| * ''n''/2 printed copies of the [[:File:All Optimistic Puzzles - Outline.pdf|optimistic puzzles]]
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| * ''n''/2 printed copies of the [[:File:All Pessimistic Puzzles - Outline.pdf|pessimistic puzzles]]
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| * ''n'' sticky notes numbered from 1 to ''n''
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| ==== Preparation ====
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| # Make sure you have prepared a [https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1AVYhZf7Yas6ydjJR0U8XKqHCAEwyObDYsEWcrIHQ34E/ spreadsheet for your section].
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| # Gather all the supplies you need.
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| # Randomly divide the numbered sticky notes into two piles of equal size. One pile is for the pairs that will receive the optimistic puzzles. The other is for the pairs with pessimistic puzzles. On a separate document or piece of paper note down which numbers are in which piles.
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| ==== Logistics ====
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| {{BoxWarning|Make sure to not distinguish between the optimistic and pessimistic pairs as you implement this!}}
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| # Two instructors must attend this section. We'll call them instructor 1 and instructor 2.
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| # Students work in pairs.
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| # Split the classroom into two halves. Instructor 1 manages one half and instructor 2 manages the other. Instructor 1 holds all the optimistic puzzles and sticky notes from the optimistic pile. Instructor 2 holds all the pessimistic puzzles and sticky notes from the pessimistic pile.
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| # Give out one sticky note per pair of students. The instructors will give out sticky notes to their halves of the room.
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| # Display your prepared spreadsheet on the projector, where each pair's success/failure will be recorded and publicly shown.
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| # Explain the activity using the following script as a guide.
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| # Each pair is given their first puzzle. The timer begins!
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| {{BoxTip|title=Script|In this activity you'll be given a set of Tangram puzzles to solve. For each puzzle you'll be given a sheet of paper with some shape to make and a set of 14 plastic pieces with which to fill in that shape. Some puzzles may have leftover pieces at the end but each shape must be exactly filled in. There's eight normal puzzles as well as one "bonus" puzzle if you get them all done. You'll be given the puzzles one at a time and your progress will be shown in the projected spreadsheet. If you complete the puzzle, loudly announce "We did it!" and the instructor that gave you your pair number will come over. They'll check your work, take your old puzzle, give you the next one, and mark down that you successfully solved that puzzle on the spreadsheet. You can also choose to skip a puzzle. In that case, you must loudly announce "We're skipping!" and your instructor will come over. The instructor will take your old puzzle, give you the next one, and mark down that you skipped the puzzle on the spreadsheet. When you skip or complete a puzzle, you can request to go back to a previous one and the instructor will give you that puzzle instead. The first pair to complete every puzzle other than the bonus one will win a fabulous prize!}}
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| ==== Instructions ====
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| # If a pair completes their puzzle, they call the instructor that handed them their sticky note over to check their solution. The instructor can then collect their current puzzle and give them the next one or a previously skipped one, their choice. Mark on the public spreadsheet with a "success".
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| # If a pair decides to skip their puzzle, they also call the instructor over to exchange their current puzzle for the next one or a previously skipped one. Mark on the public spreadsheet with a "skip".
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| # When a pair finishes all the puzzles, record the time on the spreadsheet. The pair that solves all of the puzzles first gets some prize. If a pair finishes early, they can work on the bonus puzzle.
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| {{BoxCaution|title=Reminder|Make sure to figure out the students' fabulous prize!}}
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| ==== Discussion Questions ====
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| ===== Immediate Activity Follow-up =====
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| Ask the following questions of the entire class.
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| # How do you feel?
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| # Did you use knowledge from an earlier puzzle on a later one?
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| # How did you decide when to skip a puzzle or keep working on it?
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| # Here's one more Tangram puzzle. How long do you think it would take you to solve it?
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| # Is there something else you noticed?
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| {{BoxTip|If you want, you can ask the first question of only the best and worst performing pairs of students.}}
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| {{BoxCaution|For the second to last question, show a slide with the extra Tangram puzzle. Have the students do a show of hands for under 5 minutes, 5-10 minutes, and above 10 minutes.}}
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| ===== The Reveal =====
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| At this point, the instructor reveals that there are two different orderings of the puzzles, one optimistic and one pessimistic. The optimistic ordering encourages incremental progress by providing partial puzzles whose solution can be used in a later puzzle. You can put what pair had what ordering in the "?" column of the spreadsheet with labels. Then, sort column A.
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| {{BoxTip|title=Tip|The spreadsheet will automatically color the cells in if you fill them with "O" for the optimistic pairs and "P" for the pessimistic pairs.}}
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| ===== Final Questions =====
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| Now ask the following questions of the class as well.
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| # Did the optimistic pairs perform better?
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| # Do you think there's such a thing as a "Tangram person" like there may be "math person" or "music person?" Why or why not?
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| Give the students the morals of the story.
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| * Reiterate learning goals 1-3.
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| * One can stay motivated by recognizing the value of incremental progress even when you feel you're nowhere close to the "big" goal.
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| * The "error" part of trial and error is an important type of incremental progress.
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| * Remind them of the "growth mindset" from [[3.2 Calibration of Credence Levels]]. You can improve in your persistence and "can-do" spirit by recognizing the value of incremental progress instead of feeling dejected over not having completed the overall goal.
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| <!-- == Overflow ==
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| <div class="toccolours mw-collapsible mw-collapsed" style="overflow:auto;">
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| <div style="font-weight:bold;line-height:1.6;">Extra content that's not currently part of the official lesson plan.</div>
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| <div class="mw-collapsible-content">
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| === Priming ===
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| This is a discussion-based activity that has students reflect on their own past experiences with problem solving. Two halves of the class receive different versions of a handout, one priming for optimism, and the other for pessimism. In the next activity, students will work collaboratively to solve a problem. It is hoped that the optimistically primed students will spend more time on the problem than the pessimistically primed students.
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| ==== Instructions ====
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| # Print out handouts for the "[[:File:Priming and Spinning Tube Handout (Optimistic).pdf|optimistic]]" and "[[:File:Priming and Spinning Tube Handout (Pessimistic).pdf|pessimistic]]" halves of the class.
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| # Distribute the handouts to the two halves of the class, without telling them that the handouts are different. Students within a given pair should have the same worksheet, but half of the class should receive the "optimism" prompt, half the "pessimism" prompt. {{Caution|The differences between the handouts will be revealed at the end of class after the [[#Spinning Tubes|spinning tubes]] activity is complete.}}
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| # Have the students complete the handouts.
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| === Spinning Tubes ===
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| This activity invites students to examine their own approach to problem solving and practice an attitude of scientific optimism as they attempt several types of puzzles. Students will have been primed in the previous activity to reflect on how long they persisted on the problem, and what factors motivated them to continue working. For this activity they will work as a group to investigate and understand a physics phenomenon, a task that more closely mimics real scientific inquiry.
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| ==== Preparation ====
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| There may already be enough tubes made. In this case, you don't have to make any at all. But, if you're curious, this is how you make them.
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| # Cut a section of PVC pipe that is three times as long as its diameter (around 6 cm). Err on the long side; this experiment will still work with tubes up to 3.15 diameters long. You'll need to cut one of these tubes for each table group.
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| # For each small piece of pipe make a simple mark on one end and a different mark at the other end. In the example below the pipe is marked with an X and an O: [[File:Tube Diagram.gif]]
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| # Cut a few more lengths of pipe so that you have a set of pipes with lengths that are two, four, and five times their diameters. Mark the ends of these as well. You might not need quite as many of these, as two groups can share an extra set of tubes.
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| ==== Instructions ====
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| # The instructions for students are on the same worksheets as in the priming activity. {{Caution|When students press on the O end of the pipe to set it spinning, they will see the mark on the opposite end of the cylinder (in this case the X) appear in a triangle formation as the cylinder spins (see figure below). It can be helpful to practice spinning the cylinder before the lesson, as students sometimes struggle with the task.}} {{Todo|small=no|Upload image}}
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| # You may spend anywhere from 40 to 60 minutes on this activity, making sure to leave about 13 minutes at the end of the lesson for closing discussions. During the activity, the GSI should check on every group and provide help with showing the students how to spin the tubes. But, do not tell them the explanation of the phenomenon.
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| # Tell students that if they have completed the task or have given up, they may talk to the GSI about their Project 2 topic.
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| # (13 min) [[#Whole Class Discussion Questions|Whole class discussion questions]].
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| ==== Whole Class Discussion Questions ====
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| # (1 min) Explain that half of the room got a scientific optimism manipulation (describe a time you persisted and succeeded), the other half a scientific pessimism manipulation (describe a time when you persisted and gave up before succeeding).
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| # (2 min) By a show of hands, collect and record the following numbers:
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| {| class="wikitable" style="margin: auto;"
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| | || Optimistically primed || Pessimistically primed
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| | Succeeded || ||
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| | Failed || ||
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| |}
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| See if the manipulation had any effect on success in the Spinning Tubes activity (did more people get it in the optimistic group).
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| # (2 min) If manipulation worked: Why do you think thinking about past success vs. failure affected your success on this task? If manipulation failed: Why do you think the manipulation failed?
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| # (4 min) Discuss as a whole class the [[#Explanation of the Phenomenon|explanation for the spinning tubes phenomenon]].
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| # (2 min) For groups that got the solution, how did you break down the problem?
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| # (2 min) For groups that didn't, did you break down the problem? What obstacles did you encounter? Did you get discouraged?
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| #(2 min) Consider how science works to gradually advance our understanding of the world. Describe how one feature of the scientific process could be usefully applied to policy-making (e.g. scientific optimism, iteration, peer review, etc.). Make sure to explain how your suggestions could improve policy-making processes.
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| # {{Changemaker|Dispositional flexibility is defined as the ability to "remain optimistic and, at the same time, realistic". Why might dispositional flexibility be valuable alongside scientific optimism? }}
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| # {{Changemaker|Read the following excerpt from Dean Bob Jacobsen's fireside chat:}}<blockquote>{{Changemaker|So the essence of science is to test stuff, and we didn't know how we could do it. You can't build a Big Bang. You can't actually take some stars, and push them around, and see what happens. But we have come so far in the past couple of decades that we actually can build dark matter detectors. We can build gravitational wave detectors. We can see black holes very convincingly at the center of our galaxy. And this stuff is, through the hard work of a lot of people, some of them at Berkeley, we're now able to test stuff and learn stuff that nature's gonna tell us what the truth is. A lot of really excellent theories are gonna fall apart, and I just love that. I love proving theorists wrong. That's just the joy of being an experimental physicist is you can say, "Oh nope, your theory, oops, it's gone."}}
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| # {{Changemaker|In what way has scientific optimism allowed for these innovations? How does senses and instrumentation play a role in these creations too? }}
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| ==== Explanation of the Phenomenon ====
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| The spinning cylinder is rotating in two ways. The first and most obvious way is that the tube spins, rotating around one of its ends. This is what causes the blurry circle you see. But the cylinder is also rotating a second way: It is revolving around a line down the hollow middle of the tube, in a rolling motion. As the cylinder spins, the top of one end moves in the same direction as the end that is rotating, while the top of the other end moves opposite the rotation. The arrows in the diagram below, depicting the pipe as seen from above, show how these different rotations interact.
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| [[File:Tube Explanation.gif|center]]
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| On the right end, the spinning and rolling motions cancel each other out, and when the mark on the spinning cylinder is at the top, it actually stops momentarily. On the left end, the two motions add together, causing the mark to move twice as fast as it would with either motion alone.
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| Because of the speed, the extra-fast moving mark is blurry, but the mark that stops is visible to the human eye. The three marks that appear at the edges of the blurred circle occur in this pattern because the cylinder is making three spins for every one rotation. For cylinders that are cut so that their lengths are four times the diameter show a square pattern of four marks.
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| A more detailed description of this activity can be found on the [https://www.exploratorium.edu/snacks/spinning-cylinder Exploratorium's Science Snacks archive, which includes a mathematical explanation and some additional inquiry methods that students can use to understand the phenomena.
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| </div></div> -->
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| {{NavCard|prev=5.1 False Positives and Negatives|next=6.1 Correlation and Causation}}
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| [[Category:Lesson plans]] | | [[Category:Lesson plans]] |
